The Turn for Ithaca

In The Turn for Ithaca, his 11th collection of poems, Gerard Smyth further explores his perennial subject of memory, its mysteries and revelations. In 'My Father's House', one of many poems from the land of his youth, he writes, 'One day I turned to look and it was gone', the disappearance, as ever for Smyth, an invitation to go deeper. Elsewhere, during a Zoom call, he is reminded of books "borrowed but never returned", while another poem about a broken phone box imagines "all the old conversations under the dust". Voices of loved ones, teachers and other poets populate this book whose "turn" is very much part of an onward journey.

"The Turn for Ithaca is a collection of exquisite acts of lyric generosity. Smyth's technical accomplishment is lightly-worn, but the poems are the products of a lifetime of dedication and scrupulousness, of days 'fine-tuning' the art. The integrity and humbleness that infuses the work is matched only by the fiercely free spirit of a poet. "

- Sasha Dugdale, poet and translator

"In Smyth's poetry, history and inheritance, both familial and cultural, are key themes. His is a contemporary voice that celebrates Irish experience in the second half of the twentieth-century and beyond. Many readers will recognize their own life in his poetry, and there is much to treasure in his elegiac body of work which manages to be both uniquely personal while also attuned to the universal concerns of the human condition."

- Adrienne Leavy, editor, Reading Ireland, the little magazine